Peralta custodians in struggle

Custodians are an essential part of our school. Without custodians, trash would pile up, bathrooms would be unusable; our campus would completely fall apart. You may have noticed that this process has already started, but it’s not happening because custodians are lazy. Instead, it is a result of harsh cuts imposed by the administration of our school. These cuts have given custodians an impossible workload.

Some issues affecting custodians:

Furloughs: Workers are forced to take 6 days off work per year–unpaid.

Speed-up: One worker is assigned to an area where there used to be three workers.

Limited workforce: Laney’s custodial staff has been cut from 28 to 12 — and four are subs!

Subs: Peralta is refusing to hire subs because they “don’t have enough experience”. Subs are supposed to become full-time after half a year. The shortest time a sub has worked is 2 years.

Here’s what custodians have to say:

§ “The campus is growing–but the custodial staff is not. Instead, we are shrinking.”

§ “The district office at Laney has 3 custodians assigned to it. The entire E building has 1. That shows you their priority. The administration doesn’t care so long as it doesn’t affect them.”

§ “We aren’t given enough people to do a good job — they work us like galley slaves.”

§ “When the administration looks at their budget, they cut part-time faculty and custodians. They think we’re dirt — that we are expendable.”

§ “The administration is trying to make us pay for their mistakes with their budget.”

Students and custodians working together against cuts at the University of Washington.

These cuts are not unique to custodians — all sections of Peralta are under attack. It is especially important that the most precarious people of the school — including custodians, students, part-timers, classified staff — stand together to fight back.

Cuts mean war. Time to fight back.

This flyer was written together by custodians & students at Laney College.